I sat in my French class, once again bored out of my mind. What else is new though, I mean seriously do they honestly expect us, as teenagers, to find school appealing in any way whatsoever? You’d think that by now they’d learn but nope. Here we sit, day after day, wallowing in our own sad, pitiful boredom. Well, whatever, they suck. Period.
Oh, right introductions, well I’m Shilo Fort-Nick. I hate my name, seriously. It’s lame! In fact, it’s lamer then lame! Who in their right mind names their kid Shilo? Not to say that it isn’t a nice name, just not right for me, though most people say different. Go figure, eh? Ugh, my life sucks. Okay, fine that actually isn’t even close to being true. I know for a fact that in comparison to other people’s lives, I have a pretty sweet set up what with three meals a day and all that jazz. I’m not saying I’m rich, far from it actually, we’re maybe just below the line of average when it comes to income and living conditions and stuff. It’s just my Mom and I, no sibs, and that kinda sucks sometimes, seeing as Moms almost always working or out doing other stuff, so I’m usually home alone. You get used to it, I guess. Mom works really hard trying to give me a good life and I absolutely love her for it. My Dad –if you could really even call him that- split four days after my 6th birthday. I don’t really remember him much, just that he liked to yell. But from what Mom told me about him he sounds like a deadbeat jerk of an asshole, so I really don’t feel too upset about him leaving. Though it would be nice if he’d actually send a birthday card, or a child support cheque or something once in a while, you know? The last time I actually saw my Dad was when I was about nine or so, but not since then.
Wow, I really went off topic there..... Whoops. Anyway, there I was in French class, not really paying attention at all. As I said before; what else is new?

‘Dammit... stupid French, I friggen hate foreign languages!’ I sat in class, silence surrounding the students, ruptured only by the sound of pencil on paper. The only reason this class even listens to the teacher is because he’s a tool who’ll send you to the office for ‘disrupting the class’ if you so much as cough without his consent. Stupid prick, he can’t even teach properly. The giant ‘F’ on last term’s report card holds testament to that. Yeah, my mom wasn’t too pleased about that.

Mr. Nealson was a tall, grouchy man, with reddish brown hair and just the slightest of Scottish accents. He often wore dress pants and some kind of buttoned up collar shirt.

‘Why does French have to be Canada’s second language anyways? I see more people speaking Japanese or Korean or whatever then French!’ I never did understand that.

I continued with the pointless doodling on the side of my French worksheet that I’d been doing the entire class instead of the actual work, waiting for the bell to ring, when Principal Anderson opened the classroom door and stepped inside, clearing his throat authoritatively.

“Mr. Nealson, may I talk to you for a moment please?” he asked our French teacher.

Principal Anderson was a stoutly man with thinning grey hair and large, piggly, blue eyes. All in all, he was a kindly man in his mid fifties. One of those tough but fair characters.

“Yes, of course,” Mr. Nealson made his way across the classroom and out the door, following behind Principal Anderson.

I eyed the closed door curiously for a minute, holding my gaze there longer then the rest of the students seated in the classroom, and wondered what was going on. Small, interested chatter filled the class now. Principal Anderson rarely visited the classrooms unless something was up. I sighed.

‘Whatever, I doubt it’s anything interesting.’ I mentally rolled my eyes as this. Nothing exciting ever happened at John Edwards High. It’s not a bad school, just really small, I think we have maybe three hundred fifty students top.

I looked down and stared at the doodle filled page before me. Twenty questions and not a single one answered. What a ‘me’ thing to do.

I’d nearly forgotten Mr. Nealson left the room with the principal when the door reopened and he stepped back inside. The kids quieted down as all eyes fell upon the man by the door.

“Well it appears we’ve acquired a couple of new students, so I expect you to treat them with respect.” Mr. Nealson announced to the class, stepping to the side, out of the way of the door. “Miss Fort-Nick, seeing as you’ve done next to nothing all class-“

‘Damn, he noticed!’

“-I’d like you to go over with our new classmates, what we’re supposed to be doing. Is that understood?” Public humiliation is just another form of torture Mr. Nealson loves to inflict upon me. That man has some serious hatred toward me.

I grimaced. “Okay,” Stupid jerk.

He nodded and inclined his head toward the door left ajar behind him, “Alright boys, come inside and sit down.”

The door was pushed open and in stepped two boys looking to be about sixteen or so, the same age as most kids in grade eleven. The boys were more or less average looking, unless of course you counted the fact that they were very good looking. Which, by the looks on the faces of most of the girls in the class, they certainly did. The first boy was thin but not scrawny, standing about 5 “6”. He had short, very light brown hair gelled into many small spikes which faded out into a lighter brown at the tips. He was wearing a navy blue DC shirt covered slightly by a black zip up that hung off his broad shoulders, unzipped. He had on a pair of lightly faded out blue jeans and a pair of white skate shoes with what appeared to be a horde of colourful little doodles sprawled across them. He possessed a small but ever-present smile as he stood beside his companion. What caught my attention the most, though, was a pair of bright golden eyes studying the multiple faces around the classroom. It’s safe to say that I was more then a little shocked, if not intrigued by this. I’m guessing most of you know gold isn’t a natural eye colour.

‘Huh, how peculiar...’

My eyes flickered over toward the other boy, who was shorter then the brunette, standing roughly 5 “4”. He wore a loose fitting black T-shirt with “Quick Silver” written out in graffiti on the front chest and, like the boy next to him, dark blue jeans, though his weren’t as faded nor as light in colour. He too wore skate shoes, but his were black with a bit of white on the sides. They looked slightly worn. My eyes traveled from his clothing up to his face to realize that he, like his friend- at least I was assuming they were friends -possessed the same shocking golden eyes, though his had a dark honey-hued tint to them, whereas the other boy’s were more like blazing amber. He stared out coldly at the class, his gaze fierce and serious, glaring at any that met his eyes. Including me.

‘Tch What a meanie! Though I can’t say I blame him, I mean I’d probably be pretty annoyed if a bunch of strangers were staring at me too.’

His hair, which matched his eyes in colour though not in tone, was a dark dirty blonde mop set on the top of his head, styled to look like it had been wind blown to the right, pressing against his face, and the length was quite a few inches long.

The two boys walked over to the two empty desks, one on my left side, and the other in front of that, and diagonal from me. We don’t get to choose where we sit, Mr. Nealson is a fan of the ever-popular assigned seats routine. Not like I really care all too much anyway, I mean none of my friends are even in this class. In fact, most of my friends go to St. Ruperts Private School, but I can’t afford to go there, so I’m stuck in this tiny, run down shack of a school. Sucks to be me, right? Actually, to be fair, this school is pretty decent, despite a few of the teachers. The cafe has pretty good food too. I don’t know why high schools on t.v. shows always have disgustingly nasty cafeteria food. Oh well, one of life’s great mysteries, I suppose.

The boys found their seats and sat down, the taller of the two next to me while the shorty sat in front of him. I really can’t call him a shorty considering I’m only 5 “1” myself, but lets not get into the technicalities of it all, okay? I crossed my arms, laying them out in front of me on my desk, covering up my worksheet, and resting my chin upon my crossed arms. I closed my eyes, letting a relaxed sigh escape my lips. There was only about fifteen minutes left of class, and I really didn’t feel like starting on that stupid worksheet. I’d finish it for homework, I didn’t have French again for two days. We didn’t go by Semester here we went by Linear, so we had a Day 1 and a Day 2. Day 1 we had Period 1, 2, 3 and 4, Day 2 we had Period 5, 6, 7 and 8, with lunch in between the second and third classes of course. Everyone ate at the same time since there are so few students. This was my second Period class, so that meant I had lunch next.

‘Yay! Lunch!’ I thought excitedly to myself. I swear I’m the only grade 11 who actually gets excited over lunch. I embarrass myself sometimes. I sighed, again.

“Hello!”

I jumped at the sudden sound, and straightened myself out of my relaxed position, and looked to my left, toward the voice. It was one of the new boys, the one with the gelled, spiky hair and wide grin. He was clearly amused that he’d managed to get such a response from me merely by saying hello.

“Sorry about that,” he apologized softly, his voice playful and without a trace of regret for scaring me. “didn’t mean to scare you, just wanted to introduce myself!” He seemed nice.

“Heh,” I chuckled nervously, rubbing the back of my neck sheepishly, “O-oh, um, yeah don’t worry, you didn’t so much as scare me as... startle me.” I tried, failing miserably at coming up with an excuse.

“uh huh, yeah sure” he replied, unbelievingly, “What-e-ver you say.”

I smiled. We were gonna get along great.

“Anyway, I’m Hakön Bakari, it’s a pleasure to meet’cha! Oh, and that-“ he pointed to the boy brooding in front of him, “-is Duriel Arman,” he leaned forward to whisper something to me.
“He’s a bit of an ass when you first meet him, but he’s actually a pretty cool guy when you get to know him.” he explained, returning to his original position. Well, as it turns out Duriel heard him, and shot him a glare.

“Hakön,” he inquired.

“Yeah?” Hakön replied, turning toward Duriel.

“Shut up.”

Hakön responded by pouting slightly and turned his head back to me. “So, anyway, I didn’t catch your name...”

“Well I didn’t throw it, did I?” I smirked playfully, while Hakön rolled his eyes. “It’s Shilo. Shilo Fort-Nick, and before you say anything, yes I know my name is weird.”

Hakön gave me a slightly crooked smile when I said this. “Shilo Fort-Nick,” he whispered the name quietly to himself, as if trying it out. “Well I like it, and if you think your name is weird, look at ours! Duriel and Hakön, I mean how often do you hear names like those now-a-days-“

“Hakön.” Duriel said in a warning tone, but still refusing to turn around.

“yeah, yeah,” he mumble. I blinked in confusion.

Hakön laughed lightly, though to me it seemed almost strained. “So, Shilo,” he queried, “Did you know your name is Hebrew?”

This caught me off-guard. ‘Well, that was random.’

“Um, no, I didn’t.” I really had no idea, how would I? I’m certainly not Hebrew. At least I don’t think I am. I know I have some very distant German, Polish and a tiny bit of Hungarian in me, but you’d never know it by looking. I have layered, dark brown hair reaching a few inches past my shoulders that I straighten nearly every day, thin eyebrows, light, grey eyes and a thin figure. Nothing special, nothing unique; just average.

‘I think that’s the first full sentence he’s said to me yet. Cool!’ I cheered in my mind, mentally doing a victory dance, ‘......wow. I am such a loser.’

I sighed to myself, exasperated at my own sheer idiocy.

“So,” I started, “how do you guys know that kinda stuff anyway? I mean, it’s not exactly like it’s common knowledge, right?”

This is all I've written. I'd like to know what people think of it._________________Stupid people are like Slinkys; they aren't good for anything, but you can't help but smile when you see one tumble down the stairs.